| 10:25a |
A standard history of political philosophy goes like this. First, political philosophy before 1971 was boring, very abstract, concerned with definitions (bad). Then, in 1971 Rawls made it relevant to practice (good), though he did so by eliminating politics and seeing everything in ethical terms (bad). Finally, since 1971, political philosophers have realised that political philosophy should deal with politics (good). |
| 2:38p |
[T]he idea of a natural sympathy between the deepest truths of nature and the deepest truths of the human mind, which can be exploited to allow gradual development of a truer and truer conception of reality, makes us more at home in the universe than is secularly comfortable.
Thomas Nagel, The Last Word |